


Later and Before and By Yourself

by temporalDecay



Series: a distrait life of mistakes [5]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Flushed Romance | Matesprits, Gills, Hermaphroditic Trolls, M/M, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Tentabulges, piercings in places there shouldn't be
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-06
Updated: 2013-03-06
Packaged: 2017-12-04 11:38:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/710381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/temporalDecay/pseuds/temporalDecay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Eridan deals with a series of highly stressful incidents that very nearly do away with what passes off as his sanity these days and learns a few hard lessons along the way.</p><p>No SGRUB AU, post successful coup, featuring Eridan "Oh Shit, Fuck, Fuck, Dammit" Ampora, Karkat "I Am Not Paid Enough For This Bullshit" Vantas, a really fucking cranky Psiioniic that ain't here to deal with your shit, and Feferi "You're Damn Right I Am The Empress Trollkind Needs" Peixes. Also piercings, gills, but also the sheer novelty of piercings in places other than gills.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Later and Before and By Yourself

“Ampora.” 

You look up. And _up_. That doesn’t happen often. You blink slowly behind your thick glasses as you find one supremely deadpan Equius Zahhak pinning you down with a very unamused stare. 

“Zahhak,” you venture after a moment, snapping out of it as the tablet in your hand screeches with about sixty thousand million alerts at once. “Hold on that thought.” You turn to the group of trolls slowly working on repairing the hull of the ship and stomp over with murder written all over your face. “I’m sorry, am I not speaking Common Alternian? When did I say you were supposed to patch this? I said replace the entire fucking thing.” 

“But it’s—“ 

“Look kid,” you snap, leaning forward to loom until the yellowblood is arching backwards and nearly about to fall. “Someone shot a hole in my ship. I don’t like it when people shoot holes in my ship. It pisses me off. It also means I haven’t had a good day’s sleep in nearly nine hundred hours, I’ve drunk about four times my body weight in caffeinated sugar, I have seventy million different fucking contracts to coordinate to get this baby up and running again before the fucking Subjugglator Flagship gets here, because frankly, my matesprit’s moirail scares the living shit out of me, and I don’t have time for fucking hangar workers that don’t understand simple instructions, when I’m gonna have to deal with a supremely pissed off Grand Highblood asking questions. It looks different in paper than in reality, I don’t know if you know. Someone shot a hole in my ship is a lot less fucking rage-inducing than _that!_ ”

You point at the plates along the hull where a hole easily big enough for said matesprit’s moirail to pass through is still plainly visible.

“Look,” you say, taking a deep breath to stop your panting, and casually run a hand through your hair. “I’m an understanding guy. I am the fucking epitome of understanding. I don’t throw morons that annoy me out of airlocks. And believe me, I want to. Dear god, how much do I want to. But unless you want me to grab your head,” as you proceed to do, before you lift the troll up just by the grip on the base of his neck – it’s a trick you learned while stationed in orbit around a planet in Kharon system; you’re not really hurting the kid, it just looks fucking impressive and does wonders to intimidate ballsy brats – until he’s two inches away from your face and his eyes widen hilariously, “and squish it until it goes _pop_ , I want you to remember that your only fucking goal in life right now is to do as I say. If I say jump? You ask how high. If I say bring me a fucking coffee, you’ll bring me the whole fucking pot. And if I say you replace the entire fucking plating of my goddamn ship’s hull, _you replace the entire fucking plating of my goddamn ship’s hull._ Things I do not like: fucking assholes shooting holes in my ship and fucking stupid hangar workers not following orders and making me have to squish their heads until they go _pop_.” You drop him and he lands on his ass at your feet. You snarl viciously at the entire crew. “Now get to fucking work before I decide to lobby for the reintroduction of slavery laws just so I can sell your fucking worthless asses to pay for my fucking bar tab!” 

You storm back up to the staircase where Equius continues to stare at you with something like curiosity, you think. You can’t even tell. He looks huge. _Huge-er_. It’s probably just the uniform, though. You’d pay attention and try to see what rank he’s at, given the medals on his jacket, but your vision is only marginally less blurry with the glasses than without them at the moment and you don’t trust yourself to not accidentally flop face first into his chest. Or something. If there’s someone you want to keep strict personal space rules with, it’s Equius. You climb up the stairs three at the time, tablet safely tucked under your arm, and join him back at the main floor of the hangar. 

“Sorry about that,” you say, still a little out of breath, though whether it’s from the ranting or the stairs it’s kinda hard to say. “You know how it is.” A beat. “Or well, you don’t, but trust me, you don’t want to know. Anyway what can I— _WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING?_ ” 

Equius startles at the yell – well, okay, that was more of a screech, you get screechy when you’re this frustrated – though you don’t really register it as you barrel past him towards another group of trolls pushing along a galley pantryndex. It’s like a giant fucking sylladex only less fucking capricious and a lot more efficient. It’s perfect to replace the one currently languishing in your ship except for the fact it’s totally wrong and not acceptable at all. 

“Sir!” The trolls, who are actually part of your maintenance crew and actually know how shit works, stand to attention the moment they see you walking towards them. “Is there a problem, sir?” 

“Do I look happy?” You say, pointing to your face in general and how not happy it looks, because if the circles under your eyes get even a little more sunken your eyeballs are liable to just fucking pop out and roll down the floor. “C’mon, shitfuck, do I look happy?” 

“…not particularly, sir.” 

“Yeah, I don’t feel happy. You know why I don’t feel happy?” You glare at him until he starts sweating. Literally. “Because my fucking maintenance crew is now fucking colorblind. Imagine, all this fucking shit I have to wade through and now my best trolls are color fucking _blind_.” 

“Colorblind, sir?” The chief of maintenance croaks, as if wary of invoking your wrath. 

Good. They should be fucking _terrified_ of invoking your wrath. 

“Is there echo in this hangar? Because I fucking hate echo,” you point an accusing claw at the pantryndex. “Do you see that? What color is that?” 

“…blue?” One of the youngest recruits ventures after a moment, since no one else dares speak up. 

“Blue! Glory be to the Empress, one of them is not fucking pan-damaged to the point of no return!” You turn back to the chief. “It’s fucking blue, and the requisition order I gave you, which I wrote with my bestest handwriting and even put a fucking happy smiley on it, asked for what, exactly?” 

There’s a pause. The man shuffles with his own tablet, flicking over pages upon pages of requisition forms you’ve sent in the past, oh who the fuck even knows anymore. He finds the one. You know because he stops, reads, pales and then hunches over almost all at once. 

“Orange,” he croaks out after a moment. “You asked for orange line, sir.” 

“Then why the fuck are you still standing here wasting air? _Get the fuck back to work!_ ” 

They don’t even bother to salute again, just scramble away with a whimper. You turn on your heel and storm back to where Equius is still standing, immovable like a… like a really immovable thing that you can’t really think of right now because wow, you have enough caffeine in your system you’re fucking _tasting your own thoughts_. Metaphors are out of commission for the time being. 

“Sorry,” you wheeze a little, and he shakes his head slightly. Then you see another disaster about to occur. “Oh for the love of—Zahhak, why don’t you just walk with me? I’ll listen, honest. I’m good at yelling at people and listening at the same time. At least when I’m this fucking high on caffeine. Come on we can do—“ You hoot a little as he picks you up by the back of your jacket, lifting you until your squirming about two fucking feet off the ground. “Or you can do that. That’s cool too, sure. Remind me you’re like, one of the four trolls I know that’s actually taller than me. No harsh feelings or anything. No seriously, they’re fucking up and I need to stop them and if this is what passes as your sense of humor it really fucking sucks because this isn’t what I meant when I said walk with me. I meant me walking. You know, feet on the ground. And you walking _with_ me. As in besides me. Or behind me. Or ahead of me. I’m really not picky about the special placement in the x and z axes, it’s the y I have a problem with right now.” You pause to take a breath. Then another. Your airsacks burn, nearly as bad as your bloodpusher does and has been burning since about the seventh pot of coffee. You shake your head and look at the man so unceremoniously carrying you around. He doesn’t even look a tiny bit unruffled. Jerkface. The corner of his lip twitches. You hope you didn’t say that last bit out loud. That’d fucking suck. “You’re not even listening to a word I’m saying are you.” 

“I am,” he says, expression still that infuriating, closed off mask. “I am merely choosing not to heed anything you say.” 

“Charming, really. …but yeah, okay.” You take another deep breath and ignore the taste of blood in the back of your mouth. It’s just nerves. Never in your life have you tasted blood in your mouth to find actual blood in your mouth. Unless someone punched you in the face first, at least. You don’t remember anyone punching you in the face, though, so it’s probably just nerves. You hope. “No offense, but you’re kinda a fucking asshole. Seriously, put me down. Either meaning of the phrase is okay, really. Put me down and let me go back to work, or just put me down and out of my misery before I have to deal with Gamzee My-Definition-Of-Mirth-Involves-Traumatizing-My-Moirail’s-Super-Squishy-Seadweller-Matesprit Makara. I am the super squishy seadweller matesprit, for the record. It’s me.” 

“Be quiet,” Equius says, almost plaintively. “A member of my crew has requested a meeting with you.” 

“Who? Oh shit, you said to be quiet. Sorry.” You put your hands over your mouth. You mutter the words through your fingers instead. That’s totally like being quiet, right? “I’m just curious, ‘cause if it’s someone I owe money to, I’d really appreciate it if you put me down. As in, first acception previously discussed, because most people I owe money to have a tendency to punch me in the face when they see me and let’s be honest here, the face is one of the few things I have going for me oh hey wow, ground, neat.” You wobble a little, trying to find your center of gravity again. “…wait, I’m confused. Do I need to run now? Because if I need to run I might just resign myself to get the shit beaten out of me. I don’t think I can run. I’m doing the weird ass forward tilt perpetual falling stalking but that’s not running. If I’m up against someone who can actually run, I’m so fucked.” 

You get the weirdest impression that Equius motherfucking I cannot smile for my face is forever stuck in this magnificent scowl Zahhak is laughing his ass off at you. Without even twitching a single facial muscle. You make a mental note to learn that skill. Then take your tablet and make an actual note to yourself to learn that skill. 

“Eridan?” 

You look up, squinting behind your glasses to see a blurry, burly shape in olive green and black. You can feel your synapses trying to connect, but you’re not quite sure it’s possible, not right now. You sway dangerously, when you squint too much and then strong, familiar hands are holding onto your shoulders and you’re literally nose-to-nose with Russel. 

“…your hair looks hideous,” you blurt out, blinking owlishly at his haircut. 

He summarily punches you in the solar plexus, sending you sprawling back a few feet. Or maybe he just nudged you a little and your body did the sprawling all on its own. Either way, your ass is firmly on the ground right now. 

“Talk to me after you deal with that fucking monstrosity on yours,” Russel snaps with a grin, at least you think is a grin, and you grin back a little stupidly as he hauls you up back to your feet. “The hell are you doing, Ampora?” 

“Right now?” You blink rapidly, pushing the glasses up your face and rubbing your eyes with your fingertips before letting the sturdy black frames fall down again. “Trying really, really hard not to cry. Also fixing my ship because some asshole went and put a hole in it. But most of my mental resources are currently being squandered away in the super taxing endeavor of not throwing my tablet away, lying on the ground, curling up into a little ball and bawling like a wiggler.” 

“Yeah, you should probably keep to that, even if it’s taxing and leaving you with fewer resources to do the rest.” 

“Thank you, yes, I will,” you preen a little, brushing invisible lint off your jacket. “Resource management was always my forte.” 

“I always thought screaming people into submission was always your forte,” Russel deadpans, throwing an arm over your shoulder and slowly leading you… somewhere. 

“No, silly, that’s Ag’s thing. She yells at people to get shit done, I manage resources like god’s gift to trollkind and you… you… what was it you did?” 

“Kept you both from going into cardiac arrest due to caffeine overdose.” 

“Ooooh,” you say, stretching out the o as far as your airsacks will allow it. “That’s right. That’s totally your thing.” 

Now you’re walking up the ramp into your ship’s bridge. You pause by the hull to pet the metal plating, ignoring Russel’s tugging and Equius’ looming. You’d almost forgotten about Equius. But then, you can always trust Equius to loom. 

“Shh, it’s okay, baby,” you whisper lovingly, patting the space-worn material. Lord knows how many fucking bits of space have hit the poor hull since it was built the first time. “Daddy’s gonna fix you, yes. Who’s daddy’s favoritest interstellar weapon of mass destruction? You are!” 

Russel tugs you along, and you stumble back into the bridge, cheerfully waving at the crew. They wave back somewhat bewildered. That’s just rude. You should totally ask Karkat to institute a mandatory wave-back-cheerfully-when-people-wave-cheerfully-at-you-first rule. Or something. Bridge people are so _weird_. Russel keeps an arm around your shoulders, even if he’s like. A head and a half shorter than you, so you keep an arm around his and hum along a little silly tune you can’t even remember picking up. And then you’re in your quarters, blinking a bit owlishly again because that sure as hell is Equius standing right there in the middle of your respiteblock. All ten feet of him. 

“Why are we here?” You ask, turning to Russel without hesitation, because Russel always knows what’s going on. “Is it drone season again? Because I don’t think it’s drone season again. And even if it is, I really don’t want to have sex with him.” You wave a hand at Equius, who merely arches an eyebrow at you. You give him an apologetic smile. “I mean, it’s not that I don’t dig big and muscle-y, ‘cause I do. Honest. You’re a sheer fucking incandescent piece of ass, Zahhak, no denying that. But you’re kinda huge? And you’d break me? And I like to be broken, don’t get me wrong, that’s fun as hell. But I think you’d be the kinda breaky-broken fun that ends up in a med bay visit with nurseterrorist Stockholm and you know her hands are always cold as fuck. I mean, I’m a fucking seadweller, okay? Nothing squirming about the depths of my nook should be colder than _me_. That’s just fucking… oh wow, suddenly naked.” You look down at yourself, blinking in surprise. You wiggle your toes, just because you can. Then Russel starts pushing you again and you don’t know if he’s going for the concupiscent platform or your recuperacoon. “Not to say I’m not flattered, I really am, but I kinda have more pressing business than sex right now? Even if it’s amazingly hot sex with Zahhak’s fucking musclebeast mammoth of a bulge?” Russel tips you back into the recuperacoon, holding your head up while he helps you settle your limbs into the slime. 

“No sex,” Russel says, smiling gently and delicately rubbing slime against your face. Your recuperacoon is calibrated for a seadweller, though, so the slime is extra slimy so that your gills don’t open up in the middle of the day and inhale a literal airsackful of slime. That’d be a really fucked up way to die, you think. “Shoosh, Eridan. Sleep now.” 

You stare up at Russel with the widest eyes you can muster, hoping your glasses will make them even bigger. Except you’re not wearing your glasses anymore. You lost them along with your tablet and your clothes. Undeterred by the handicap, however, you suck in a breath as you wibble. 

“But my ship has a _hole_ in it.” 

“I know, Princess,” and then Russel paps your face gently and you purr somewhere in the back of your throat, because you remember being called Princess before. It was nice. You liked it, then. You like it, now. 

“It’s a really fucking big hole,” you insist, trying to resist the effects of the slime as Russel gently rubs more of it against your chest. 

“It is, but when you wake up it’ll be gone.” 

“But—“ 

“Shoosh, Princess, sleep for me.” 

When you surrender to the embrace of sopor, you don’t dream. You’re vaguely aware you should be glad for that. 

  


* * *

  


“I hate everything,” you say, words muffled into the table, arms hanging listlessly off your shoulders. “ _Everything_.” 

“You don’t hate everything,” Russel says, patient as ever, and nudges you until you force yourself to sit up right. “For one, you love food, Ampora. You’re the greatest bottomless pit I’ve ever known in my life.” 

“Everything except food, then,” and you’re whining. Part of you is vaguely aware that Equius fucking Zahhak is still looming somewhere in the background and you should probably stop whining in his presence before he bursts a blood vessel over the sheer uncouthness of whining, but the rest of you is suffering under the mother of all migraines and you honestly can’t give a fuck. “And okay, you. And Kar. And Ag. And my ship. But I hate everything else.” You pause. “Oh shit, there’s a goddamn hole in my fucking ship.” 

“Shoosh, Princess,” Russel says, patting your back and fingering the hair at the nape of your neck. “It’s almost fixed.” 

“But that’s my job,” you whine some more, and then someone puts a giant bowl of broth-y soup in front of you. You blink blearily down at it, and see noodles and veggies and strips of meat in it. And then the smell hits your nose and your innards fucking roar. You feel your mouth water to the point you might be drooling. You resist taking the spoon and look up at Russel with wide, wide eyes. “There’s a fucking hole in my ship and I’m the one that’s supposed to fix it.” 

“You’ve nearly done it, Princess. All those forms and orders, it took everyone a bit to get into the swing of it, but they’ve been working on it steadily while you were asleep.” Russel smiles at you and nudges the spoon closer to your hand. 

“I don’t sleep while my men are working,” you deadpan, scowling. “I don’t sleep while there’s a fucking hole in my ship. Why the fuck did you put me to sleep while there was a hole in my ship?” 

“Because you needed to,” Russel says, matter-of-factly. “And now you need to eat.” 

“But—“ 

“I promise you can go take a look at how the hole is coming along, once you’re done eating.” 

You take a spoonful of broth and shove it into your mouth. It’s hot and spicy and slides down your throat like the fucking nectar of the gods, and your insides churn angrily for more. You put the spoon down, though. 

“Done.” 

“Eridan.” 

“There’s a _hole_ in my ship,” you whine again, but you don’t really complain about having some more of that broth. And the noodles. Or the meat. 

You finish twelve bowls before your gastric sack stops twisting and threatening to digest itself. But now you’re sleepy and bloated, and when you head out into the corridor, Russel nudges you back to your quarters and helps you out of your clothes. Then he shuffles you back into the slime and you know you’re forgetting something but there’s a sated warmth in the pit of your belly and all you want is to sleep. 

“Fucking cheater.” 

“Shoosh, Princess, shoosh.” 

  


* * *

  


The cycle repeats itself several times, food and sleep, food and sleep, until you wake up at some point and your head is clear and pain free and you find yourself looking up at Russel’s concerned face. You sit up slowly, not particularly concerned with modesty, considering everything the greenblood has seen. 

“…why do I have a feeling I did something summarily stupid and my pan is trying to protect me from it by blocking essential memories from me?” 

“They put a hole in your ship,” Russel says, reaching out a hand to brush your hair off your face. You blink slowly, nodding. “So you decided to fix it.” 

“Please tell me there’s no longer a fucking hole in my ship, or I’m going to lose my shit.” 

“You already did that, Princess.” Russel wipes globs of sopor off your face. “You went into a manic fit.” 

You feel yourself paling, flinching away from his touch. You hate that. You hate the way you had to be a fucking super special snowflake and instead of getting the usual highblood problems like uncontrollable rages or homicidal rampages, your personal flavor of psychotic is… well, different. It doesn’t happen often, which you suppose it’s a blessing since you don’t have a moirail, but you fixate on things. Back in the Academy, you once fixated on a subject you were certain you were going to fail, after your last conversation with Karkat. Usually, when you focus on something, good things happen. You solve problems pretty quickly, when you’re focused. But when you fixate on something you stop paying attention to anything else. You stop eating, you stop sleeping, and everything else becomes secondary and eventually unimportant. It’s as unstoppable as one of Gamzee’s rampages and just as irrational as Equius’ fits of rage. The problem is that unless people are inherently familiar with them, it’s very hard to recognize one until it’s reached a dangerous point. 

“That’s why you’re calling me Princess, isn’t it,” you say suddenly, blinking up at him as he continues to fuss. “You’re moirailing my ass.” 

“Problem?” Russel asks, arching an eyebrow and not bothering to deny it. 

“None really,” you sigh in relief. “I’m glad you’re doing this, I really am. I was just wondering if I’d mysteriously acquired a moirail during this little fit.” 

“Nope,” he grins, ruffling your hair affectionately. “Just me. Ready to face the world?” 

“Not until you tell me how bad it was,” you see the smile vanish from his face and you reach out to hold his hands. “How bad did it get, Rus?” 

“Your matesprit got hurt.” You feel your veins filling with liquid ice. Russel shrugs. “As far as I can tell, that’s probably what set you off. The Chancellor got knocked out by debris and from what I heard you took command almost ferally. I don’t think anyone really knew how to question it so they just rolled with it. You started fussing about fixing the hole in your ship, which incidentally involved getting the Chancellor and any other injured parties proper treatment, and somehow getting to the nearest repair station. And then you stopped eating and sleeping. You were drinking coffee by the pot and shoveling fistfuls of sugar just to keep yourself going. But you were still coherent and sharp, so they thought it was just worry making you quirky and they kept working under your orders. It wasn’t until the Chancellor himself tried to reason with you that he realized there was something wrong. They didn’t know what it was and you wouldn’t sit still long enough for anyone to examine you, so the Chancellor himself trolled us.” 

“Us?” 

“Me and Agness,” Russel clarifies, then reaches to flick your right fin. You whine because that fucking _stings_. “Imagine my surprise, Eridan, as I’m minding my business and going through my work, when suddenly I get a secure connection and the fucking High Chancellor’s candy red text all over my screen. I nearly pissed myself, holy shit.” 

“He does that,” you say a little ruefully, smiling as Russel helps you step out of the recuperacoon and lets you hold onto his arm as you head into the ablution block. “He freaks out when he’s worried, especially if he’s worried about me.” 

“Well, Agness couldn’t leave her post, since her station is preparing to receive the Empress and her entourage. And I happened to have been recently dispatched into a new ship under the command of someone close enough to the Chancellor.” 

“Zahhak.” You step under the spray of the shower with a low, pleased moan, feeling the hot water loosen up all your tense muscles. 

“Indeed.” Russel arches an eyebrow. “Who categorically refused to let me help until the Chancellor ordered him to, and then he refused to leave me alone with you until I assured him you were back to your senses, because he was sure you were going to try and strangle me.” 

“Zahhak is still under the impression that I loathe landdwellers,” you mutter under your breath, shivering under the spray. “Because Zahhak was once under the impression that I hated him.” 

“I don’t know, Eridan,” you glare as Russel smirks at you, and then bow your head so he can lather up your hair and scrub slime out of it. “You were really laying it on thick on him while he was here.” 

“Just because I’ve always secretly wanted to straddle his hips and ride his monstrous bulge until I can’t walk a straight line, possibly for the rest of my life, it doesn’t mean I have actual, genuine _feelings_ for him.” 

Russel laughs, rinsing your hair and shoving you a little further under the spray. 

“Yeah, if you can start splitting hairs about shit, then you’re definitely back to normal.” 

Because you’re the epitome of maturity, you flick water at him. 

  


* * *

  


The moment you come out of the door to your quarters, you’re all but tackled by a tiny, clingy, beautiful troll named Karkat Vantas. You slide down to your knees and wrap your arms around him, clutching him tight enough it looks like you want to sneak him under your skin. You nuzzle the side of his face and press loving little kisses down his neck and you don’t give a fuck anyone’s watching, because your matesprit was _hurt_ and you were too fucking _crazy_ to really do anything about it. 

“I’m sorry,” Karkat says eventually, fingering your fins. 

“You don’t have anything to feel sorry about, love,” you smile gently at him, taking his hands in yours so you can kiss his knuckles. 

“I didn’t notice,” Karkat insists, looking miserable. “You were hurting and I didn’t notice.” 

“It’s okay,” you chuckle a little, kissing his forehead. “I didn’t notice either.” 

He doesn’t find it funny. Nonetheless, you hold him close again. And when you find Equius still staring at you, you bare your teeth at him, challengingly, as if to say he isn’t welcome. You decide to put the whole incident behind you, for the sake of your sanity. Despite it all, your plans and the decisions you took while in the throes of mania were the right ones, and the ship is nearly ready to take off towards the station where you’re expected to meet the Empress. You’re still not sure how you’re gonna handle that, except maybe staying in your block all the time to ensure you don’t run into her at all. 

But those are worries for later. It can all wait until you’re done hugging the shit out of your matesprit. 

  


* * *

  


“Arms wide, here I come!” 

You hoot a laugh and spread your arms obediently, catching Agness as she leaps off from the second floor. You spin a few times as she holds onto you with arms and legs. 

“Where’s my favorite tealblood in the history of ever?” You ask, looking up at her with a grin. 

“I don’t know, where’s my favorite fishbait-slash-pincushion?” 

You stick your tongue out at her. Agness, being Agness, sticks out her tongue right back at you. You keep up this important exercise of maturity and self-control until Russel shoves you both. 

“What are you, three?” 

Still holding Agness in your arms, you turn around and then you both stick your tongues out at him. This is clearly the best possible way to reunite after ten sweeps scattered out in the galaxy. You share a laugh at the sheer ridiculousness of it, and you finally put Agness down. She then hits you, hand open and palm extended, right in the gut. Rather than hurt, you feel like someone untied a really heavy weight down your back. 

“Ooh—“ 

“Something small and manageable, Princess, I remember you saying that,” Agness huffs, folding her arms over her chest. “You know why I remember? Because my jaw hit the fucking floor when I heard you were in charge of the fucking _Leviathan_.” 

“I was honestly a bit more surprised to see him quadranted to the High Chancellor, myself,” Russel muses almost absently, and you roll your eyes. 

“I know I’m fascinating,” you say, running a hand through your hair, “but I’m bored of me. So c’mon, share gossip that doesn’t relate to me.” 

You avoid the first foot that shoots out to trip you. And the second. But then they roll and turn and you recognize the move far too late. You find yourself twisted and flipped until you land on your back with a huff. 

“You know what else you are?” Agness grins, nudging your leg. “Out of shape.” 

As if to prove her wrong, you roll back to your feet with as much grace as you can muster, and then trot after them. Feferi will arrive in a few hours, but everything has been already been prepared. Ships are restocked and the station itself is decorated and set out to receive such a large group of trolls. There will be a parade and a party and several celebrations to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the station being thrown into orbit around its star and for several nights, everything will be about Feferi. In a more overt way than it always is, at least. There are a thousand other places you would rather be, rather than here, when Feferi arrives. Including hell. But you can’t leave Karkat behind and he’d never forgive you if you left without him. So you’re gonna have to grin and bear it. The unexpected boon of finding your friends present is something you want to believe heralds a good experience. 

It has to be, you do not even allow yourself to contemplate otherwise. 

  


* * *

  


Karkat gave you an itinerary of where Feferi will be, and you memorized it so you know exactly when you should avoid specific areas in the station. You’ve decided to keep yourself to the staff areas mostly, since that’ll help you avoid the rest of the group. You have no love for any of the others and you have no doubt Equius will gladly share with them every detail about your little episode. You can’t keep monopolizing Agness forever, but you know she’ll come share gossip once she’s done with her shift. And the same goes for Russel. You’ve studied the maps and the itinerary and decided the recreational deck for the staff and actual operational personel of the station will do just fine. So there you are, absently rehearsing your old exercise sets from the Academy, wondering how much your shortness of breath is from the sheer amount of caffeine you nearly poisoned yourself with, and how much is it you really being out of shape. You suppose in the end it doesn’t really matter. You close your eyes and try to remember the feeling of a clustered practice block, full of students and snarling teachers. You force yourself to breathe slowly as you work through the basics, trying to clear your mind and avoid a panic attack. You’re still upset, about the burst of mania Russel got you out of, and if you’re not careful, something could trigger it again. 

You’re finally getting into the rhythm of things when you hear a whisper. Your fins twitch a little and you open your eyes only to find yourself alone. The whisper persists, though, indistinct but very nagging. You decide to go up the stairs and see what is going on, but as soon as you step up, you come face to face with a thin, emaciated troll. You stare at him for a long moment, taking in the cane and his robes – seriously, who wore robes in this day and age? – as well as the shape of his horns and the peculiar coloring of his eyes. Then you stare some more. He looks like Captor. He looks _a lot_ like Captor. But Captor doesn’t carry around a little walking stick and Captor isn’t frail and thin, not like this. And then it hits you, after a moment, and your jaw threatens to hit the floor. 

You knew they’d recovered the Condescension’s ship after the duel. And you knew who the helmsman was, and that out of consideration for Captor, Feferi had ordered them to try and save the poor troll. But you never thought in a million sweeps you’d find yourself standing face to face with him. For one thing, because Captor is probably having a conniption at the thought of you talking with his Ancestor. For another, well. Because you weren’t around when it happened, were you? He doesn’t look so bad, for someone who spent fuck knows how many sweeps as a ship’s engine. Fastest ship in the fleet, at that. 

“You. Uh. Oh fuck.” You scramble up the stairs, coming to a stop a few steps away from him. “…is something the matter?” He stares at you through eerily impassive eyes. “You sure? ‘cause if you want to go down there I can help. Or leave.” He tilts his head ever so slightly to the side, so you press on a little more. “Is that what you want? ‘cause I can do that. It’s not like I’m doing anything important.” 

His lips move, but it takes you a moment to realize you’re not listening to his _voice_. Not exactly. The frequency is different. Something inside you hurts a little, because that used to be how you and Feferi talked when you were alone. It takes practice to make sounds like that on land, because air doesn’t handle sound the same way water does. Your fins twitch, the rings in them jiggling a little. You’ve never met a landdweller who could imitate it before. 

“Uh, hiding from Fe—from the Empress,” you rub your knuckles with your thumbs, shrugging awkwardly. “She. Eh. She doesn’t like me much.” 

The troll’s lips twitch into a smirk that’s so like Captor’s except… _deeper_. Where everything about Sollux is about smugness and arrogance and being a little fucking bitch to everyone around him, this troll gives you the feeling he’s all-knowing, or nearly as much. He’s old and worn and, you think, the right word for it is _wise_. It’s fucking fascinating. You tilt your head a little, straining to make sure you don’t miss a thing. 

“I don’t… well, I mean I know what you _were_ ,” you resist the urge to fidget. He’s about a head shorter than you, but between the stairs and the eeriness of his stare, plus the whole fucking weight of who the hell you’re talking to, you can’t help but feel insignificantly small. “But that’s not who you are. Not really. I don’t think?” You swallow hard. “Maybe I should shut up.” 

He rasps a quiet laugh, nowhere near as acid as Captor’s. It sounds amused, more than mocking. His lips twitch around the sound, and you feel yourself flush in sheer mortification. You’re acting like a wiggler and it sucks. You want to blame some of it on the shaky hold you have on your mind and your emotions at the moment, but honestly. You know you’d still be wagging your tail like a fucking puppy in front of him, even if you were at your best. Still, your pride stings at the idea of a groveling seadweller. 

“Yeah, I’ve never met a troll as old as you before, either,” you snap back, defensively, and hunch over somewhat. “I don’t even know what the fuck I’m supposed to say.” He arches an eyebrow and you stare. “What do you mean why? Holy fucking shit, do you even realize— _you’re living fucking history_. Everything you’ve seen and lived through? How the fuck do you even put a name to all that?” He scoffs and you shrug. “I always liked history, okay. Seemed a good place as any to learn how shit works.” 

You’re pretty sure his next words cause your bloodpusher to stop and refuse to go back to work. Ever. You stare at him like he’s the fucking coolest shit in the world and you don’t even care if it’s proper or not, holy fuck. 

“…if you want?” You’re a bit uncertain, because it sounds too fucking good to be true. “I mean, shit. That’d be like all my wiggling day gifts from now til I die, rolled into one.” 

He starts going down the stairs, but when you try to help you get yourself a smack with the cane. You get the feeling he’s used to smacking people with the cane, because that, right there? That was fucking _technique_. You rub your arm and keep your distance as he maneuvers. You realize, after a moment, that he’s probably trying to train his body to work as it should, since he could probably just float about just fine with his psionics. You read somewhere that those get stronger with age, and if that’s true, he’s probably the most powerful troll in the galaxy, speaking on terms of raw power alone. So you let him go down the stairs if he wants to go down the stairs, and try not to fidget while you wait. He nudges you over toward the observation deck, the pointy tip of the cane digging in between your shoulder blades. You hover a little anxiously as he folds himself down to sit facing the reinforced panoramic. Then you yelp in surprise when he smacks you right in the back of your knees and you go down with an embarrassing sound of surprise. 

“Yeah, well, the thing is, I _can_ understand you,” you glare a little sullenly, rearranging your limbs so you’re less of a disgraceful sprawl. “I don’t know if they told you? But you’re bound to figure it out anyway, I’m dumb as bricks. But the thing about being as fucking dumb as me, is that words work. _So use your fucking words_.” He smacks your arm with the cane and you sulk. “My bad. Use your fucking words, _please_.” 

His lips quirk oddly, not quite a smile, not quite a smirk, but, fortunately for you, he decides to use his words indeed. And then you’re well and truly lost to the world. 

  


* * *

  


“Princess?” 

Psii – he told you to call him Psii, holy fucking shit, you’re _still_ having a moment over that – stops his narration and tilts his head as if to better pinpoint the source of the sound. 

“They’re my friends,” you explain, fidgeting. “They’re looking for me.” He doesn’t even ask, really, just staring at you with those freakishly weird eyes of his. “It’s just a thing Ag likes to call me.” Very slowly, very deliberately, he arches an eyebrow at you. You wonder how long it took him to perfect that gesture. Summarily you decide it doesn’t matter because it’s a fucking pain in the ass. You shrug. “Do you want to meet them or should I tell them to go away?” You shake your head. “No, a tealblood and a greenblood.” Then you offer a small smile. “They’re pretty damn nice, honest.” 

After a moment, he nods. You nod back and roll back to your feet before heading up for the stairs to catch up with them. 

  


* * *

  


“So let me get this straight,” Russel says after a moment, eyes going from you to Psii, back and forth. The yellowblood is busy picking on the food that was supposed to be for you, but you don’t have it in you to tell him not to. “You’re trying to tell me, this here, is none other than the oldest living troll in the galaxy, ex-helmsman of the _Battleship Condescension_ and also the actual, honest to fucking god Ancestor of Sollux Captor, the Empress’ matesprit and your matesprit’s kismesis?” 

You shrug and steal a bit of deep fried meat from Agness’ plate. 

“Pretty much.” 

Russel stares at you a moment longer, before he nods slowly. 

“Okay.” 

“Okay?” Agness retorts, not nearly as calm. “ _Okay?_ There’s nothing okay with this. Princess, you’re going to get into so much shit over this isn’t even funny.” 

“What, why?” 

“Because with your fucking luck, someone’s going to decide you _kidnapped_ him or something.” You stare at Agness earnest face for a moment before you crack up cackling. At your side, the millennial troll wheezes a breathy laugh. “I mean it!” 

“I don’t think you unders—“ You blink and turn to see Psii smirk smugly. “Well damn.” 

“And another thing, that whole seadweller speech thing? It’s not really gonna help your case at all.” Agness huffs. Then throws her arms up in the air after everyone stays quiet. “Well? What did he say?” 

“That the next person who suggests he should be locked up in any shape or form is gonna get a one-way ticket to the furthest corner of the galaxy.” You snort as Psii looks unbearably smug like only a Captor could be, even if he’s licking sugar off his fingers. “And he says I should make emphasis on the fact the trip doesn’t include the spaceship.” 

“ _Can_ you do that?” Russel asks him, head tilted to the side. 

Psii just grins, baring his teeth. 

“I don’t think we want to find out,” Agness decides after a moment, and you definitely agree. She sighs, rubbing her forehead with the heel of a hand. “Okay. Fine. Now what?” 

  


* * *

  


Russel, Agness and you stare at the four cards Psii just put down. You then share the same incredulous look, before folding your puny hands simultaneously. Psii bares his teeth and reaches out to grab his earnings with a smirk. 

“Did you just cheat?” You can’t help but ask, squinting at him a little. His lips twitch as color blooms high over your cheekbones. “I’ll have you know I am an excellent loser.” Agness is biting the inside of her lip and Russel isn’t even pretending to hide the roll of his eyes. You flush harder. “It makes sense in context.” 

“Sure it does,” Russel snickers, gathering the cards and shuffling them back. 

Left without any other options, you stick out your lower lip and pout for all you’re worth. 

  


* * *

  


“Well, my matesprit likes it.” 

Agness slaps your hip and you snort but fall silent even as Psii snickers a soft puff of air between his teeth. This is different than actual piercings, but you hope Karkat will like the effect. You hadn’t really expected to have an audience when you asked Agness to do it, though. But when Agness mentioned it, Psii showed some interest and you didn’t know how to say no. So here you are, lying on your chest with Agness sitting on your ass, sticking needles along the curve of your spine. The old yellowblood circles you almost curiously, watching attentively as each needle slides home under your skin, a small ring hanging off the exposed tip. They don’t hurt quite as much as the actual piercings do, but you can feel the needles in place and it’s a little bothersome. 

“Okay, break time,” Agness says after a moment, sliding off your back, “let’s see how well can you walk with those in place.” 

Moving is an experience, alright. You hold yourself a little stiff, not really wanting to upset the needles or the skin rubbing against them, but after a moment you find the right angle for your back and it’s pretty bearable. While you walk a few laps around the block, with Agness closely watching the way the needles are behaving, Russel gives Psii a curious look. 

“So, why the whole seadweller speech, though? Can’t you like…” He makes a vague gesture with his hand. 

“I can,” and you were expecting him to sound like Captor, but his voice is hoarse and rough, in an entirely different pitch. “But it’s tiresome. Condesce had them alter my throat, because she hated it when I talked to anyone else. Since there were no other seadwellers allowed on me. On the ship.” He frowns. He slipped like that before, too, but you didn’t mention it, because it seemed to upset him. Thankfully, neither Agness nor Russel seem to have any urge to make note of it. “I was only allowed to speak with her. I realized I could still talk, because they couldn’t take it all away without leaving me mute, but she culled anyone I spoke to anyway.” He shrugs, and all of a sudden he looks his age, even though he really just looks a couple decades older than you. “She was a very pitiful creature.” 

“You don’t sound like you hated her,” Russel notes almost absently, but you drown the end of his sentence with a strangled yelp because Agness rips out a needle from your back. 

Psii plops down in the plushy chair by the desk, settling his limbs a little awkwardly in place. You realize he always looks like he doesn’t know what to do with them, arms and legs, like he’s gone so long without them the novelty of having them back is almost a nuisance. Agness hisses at Russel, but you can’t stop staring at the way the yellowblood stares intently at your husktop’s screensaver. When he finally says something, you feel a strange sort of sadness you can’t quite explain. 

“He says,” you intone, interrupting Agness and Russel’s hushed bickering, feeling something formless and painful sitting in the pit of your gut, “he says you can only hate someone like her for so long, before you start to realize just how lonely they really are.” 

  


* * *

  


“I’d invite you to dinner,” you say a little awkwardly, shuffling in place and not quite looking at the man in the eye, “but you’ll probably go the gala, right?” He purses his lips, like he’s thinking about it. You chuckle wryly. “Yeah, I’m not invited. Or well, I am, technically, ‘cause I’m Kar’s matesprit, but I really don’t want to go.” 

That’s a lie and you know it, but you’ve been ignoring the part of you that wants to scream in frustration at the sheer unfairness of it all, because then you’re going to break down crying like a wiggler or go off into another fit, and you can’t afford to because once you start, you’re pretty sure you won’t be able to stop, either fit or crying. You want to dress up and show up at Karkat’s right and keep him company and have fun. You’d gladly put up with Gamzee and Captor for the pleasure of just going out and be _seen_. Maybe then you could put a stop to the stupid rumors about you and the snide, petty remarks insinuating Karkat is ashamed of being seen with you. But if you walk into the reception block, you’d have to see Feferi and the others and then it’d end up going down in flames. So you sit on your jealousy and the burning resentment, because if Karkat has to keep you hidden away for the sake of keeping the peace, you’ll grin and bear it and never let him know how much it hurts. 

You walk Psii along the corridor towards the Empress’ flagship. You’re pretty sure you shouldn’t get too close to it, but you can at least walk him halfway there. Karkat, bless his heart, had the _Leviathan_ dock at the exact opposite side of the large hangar. Psii doesn’t seem to really mind the long walk, though he is mildly amused when you hunch over and hurry a little when you’re passing by the _Messiah_. You keep your hands inside the pockets of your pants and resist the urge to squirm at the feeling of chains and needles in your back. 

“Well, they don’t really like me much?” You chuckle wryly, forcing yourself to keep your steps even with his. “I mean, they’ve got more than enough reasons not to like me. I was a pretty fucking stupid kid, back in the day.” Your lips twitch. “Dumb as bricks, yeah, but worse. At least these days if shit hits the fan, the only one that gets hurt is me.” You earn yourself a sharp smack with that cane for that. “Ow, what?” 

Psii stares at you like you’re a really dimwitted grub. Which you suppose you are, all things considered. Then he rolls his eyes with a flourish and smacks you again with the cane, crankily picking up the pace again. You scratch the side of your head a little, before you hurry along to catch up with him. He’s still this swelling, imposing, mildly terrifying troll, but you can’t for the life of you stop being fascinating by every little thing. You don’t even care if he smacks you or rolls his eyes at you or calls you dumb or cheated in every game of cards you and your friends taught him. _He told you stories_ . You’re pretty sure he could ask you for your soul and you’d still smile dumbly and let him take it, because _he told you fucking stories_. You’re so busy taking a moment to flail about the fact he told you motherfucking stories that you nearly miss what he says next. You half trip your step a little. 

“Uh.” You duck your head a little self-consciously. “…sure?” 

He nods to himself, looking smug, but doesn’t say anything else. Since you can’t think of anything to say that doesn’t sound incredibly asinine, you shut your trap and instead concentrate on walking and ignoring the way your insides are doing flip flops under your ribs. You stay back when the _Dream Chaser_ appears around the corner, but keep watching as Psii slowly hobbles his way to it. From a purely professional point of view, you might have a bit of a thing for that ship. Because it’s such a fucking gorgeous ship. They designed it to be both reminiscent and opposite to the _Battleship Condescension_ , so it looks almost like it was flipped upside down, but with far less dramatic angles. Gentle, swooping curves and a very regal built. It’s the perfect ship for the Empress, and it also dwarves everything else in the hangar with terrifying ease. Your _Leviathan_ – it’s not yours-yours, not like you once dreamed a ship like that would be, but it’s yours because you know every corner and wire and panel inside out – is less bulky, built for speed, but it still paints a pretty damn impressive picture. You are still standing there, long after Psii has disappeared from view, just breathing. Just existing. Then you let out a shuddering breath, forcefully evicting the gnarled knot of thoughts and scorn trying to choke you, and turn back to your ship. 

You have dinner in the galley, listening to the cooks bitch and moan about this and that, sharing gossip with you and trying to get you to share your own. They send you away with a heaping bowl of frozen sweets and threats to go on strike if you don’t do somehow arrange to widen their budget a little. You run a tight ship, scrupulously going over expenses and trying to make every single penny count, because you will not let Karkat come under scrutiny over it. Still, you suppose you can look over the numbers again. You think it might not be a gala with the highest of the high, in the new Empire, but you can be happy with what you have. Your crew likes you well enough and more than a few of them have admitted to be glad you’re back to yourself. And they put up with your whining and let you stash treats and snacks anywhere you want, and pretend not to know where they came from when Karkat or the captain run a routine inspection and find a drawer full of chocolate. It’s not fame and luxury, with all the glamour you dreamed of when you were a kid, not by a long shot. But it’s all you have, and it’s yours and no one can really take it away from you because it’s _yours_. 

You still have a few hours to get through before Karkat comes back – and you want to think he’ll come back, even though you’re aware you’re being thoroughly selfish, he could just as much want to spend the day with Gamzee or Captor and he’d be entirely within his rights to do so; after all, he sees you every fucking night without miss and they’re always stationed elsewhere – so you just sit on the floor by your recuperacoon, husktop by your feet and bowl of sweets in your lap, and set out to watch a movie or sixteen. 

And if you pick the saddest ones, it’s not because you’re looking for an excuse to cry by yourself in a dark room because the world is _unfair_. Of course not. 

  


* * *

  


You wake up with Karkat, still in his best dress uniform, curled up in your lap, nuzzling the side of your face and pressing little kisses to your collarbone. You curl your arms around him, sighing contently. 

“Any reason you were sleeping on the floor instead of a goddamn recuperacoon like a civilized troll?” 

“Was waiting for you,” you slur, accent heavy as your tongue slides against your fangs. “Did you have fun?” 

“Vriska and Terezi started making out in a corner after Kanaya and Aradia just flat out gave up trying to keep them from causing trouble. Nepeta and Equius were dripping pale everywhere. Sollux kept playing footsie under the table and I couldn’t stand up for like an hour until he stopped playing with my fucking bulge. Tavros introduced his new moirail and Gamzee scared the shit out of him before I could shooshpap his fucking ass into submission. And Feferi looked radiant and gorgeous and didn’t giggle even once during the speeches. It was a fucking disaster and I expect half the goddamn fleet will threaten sedition after the newsfeeds make the rounds.” Karkat lets out a drawn out breath, collapsing into your arms. “I wish you’d been there.” 

Something inside you throbs delicately, the old crack in your soul. You refuse to acknowledge it, because every time you do, you only manage to fuck shit up spectacularly. You nuzzle the top of Karkat’s face and smile hollowly. 

“I don’t belong there,” and it’s the truth and nothing will ever change it. 

“I know,” Karkat says, resigned and unaware of how much it hurts that he is, “but I still wish you’d been there to distract me from all the murder I wanted to commit halfway through the stupid thing.” You chuckle wryly, taking his hand in yours and raising it so you can press a small kiss to his knuckles. “And you? What did you do all night?” 

“Kept myself out of trouble.” 

Karkat squints up at you. 

“Eridan.” 

You hesitate, before gathering aplomb and hoping for the best. 

“I met Captor’s Ancestor.” You swallow hard. “He was nice. Cranky and a fucking menace with that cane of his, but nice. We talked for a while, and then Rus and Ag brought us lunch… well, me, technically, but he ended up eating most of it. Then we discovered we’re severely outmatched when it comes to card games, explored a bit of the station and then came back here because he wanted to see Ag turn me into a pincushion. Then I walked him back to the _Dream Chaser_. Well, not all the way because… yeah, but I made sure he got there fine. And then I came back, had dinner, stole some snacks from the galley and watched a few movies.” You shrug carefully. “So yeah. Kept myself out of trouble.” 

Karkat is staring at you with an unreadable expression that makes dread curl up inside you, gnawing at your gut. 

“Are you trying to tell me you spent the night babysitting Sollux’s Ancestor?” 

“Not babysitting,” you insist, immediately remembering the smug smirk and the promise of spaceship-free interstellar flights. “Just. Hanging out, I guess. It was a little weird, but he told me some stories.” You try to keep the giddiness out of your voice and think you might not have been as successful as you wanted, because Karkat’s still looking at you like you’ve gone mad. “He said he’d like to chat again tomorrow, if I was free.” You mumble the rest of the words, somewhat self-conscious. 

“He _talked_ to you?” 

“Yeah. And to Ag and Rus, too, but he said he didn’t really liked to talk… to talk landdweller style if he could help it.” 

“But he _talked_ to you, right?” Karkat’s expression is a frown you don’t know how to interpret. “And he didn’t try to hurt you or your friends at all.” 

“What? No!” You shift, settling him so he’s straddling your hips and you can look at him in the eye properly. “Well, he did threaten to fling someone out to the other side of the galaxy if anyone said anything about locking him up, but I think he was joking. Uh. I. Kinda hoped he was joking. Sort of. I think he’s pretty capable of doing that, but he didn’t really seem to be inclined to do it. At least not to us.” 

“The Helmsman doesn’t talk to anyone,” Karkat says, enunciating slowly, looking at you through wide, disbelieving eyes. “The Helmsman doesn’t hang out with anyone, or play cards with anyone or just… He doesn’t _like_ anyone.” You’re flinching back, pressing yourself against the side of your recuperacoon when Karkat realizes the look on your face and reaches out to hold your face in his hands. “No, no, Eridan. Baby, no, you didn’t do anything wrong.” 

“But—“ 

“Did he tell you what happened when we found him?” Karkat softens his voice and traces his fingers along the arches of your fins, reassuringly. 

“Not really?” You swallow hard, wishing you knew what the hell is going on just so you could decide whether you’re justified in freaking out or not. “I just. I said I liked history. And I guess I made a fool of myself, but he found it amusing and… I don’t know. _He told me stories_ , Kar. Mostly about rebellions and random tidbits about conquering worlds and what the Condescension was like. It was kinda disjointed and rant-y in places, but he told me stories about things _he saw happen_. And then Ag and Rus came about, and he started talking about how the Battleship Condescension was run and complaining about the admins it’d had in the past and… and… _I don’t know_. It was weird and kinda awesome too. But he wasn’t angry or anything and we were just having fun, I didn’t think I was screwing up.” You swallow hard. “I swear, I didn’t mean to fuck shit up again but he kept slipping up and calling himself a ship and I thought it’d be really fucking douchey to not stick around if he wanted company. He looked so _tired_.” 

You can’t afford to fuck up. Not here, not now. Not with Feferi _there_. You’re such a fucking moron you spent most of the night wallowing on your selfishness, and never stopped to wonder what kind of ridiculous trouble you might have gotten Karkat into for it. You brought him into your ship, into your fucking _respiteblock_. Rus and Ag had permission, sure, but you should have known better. Why don’t you ever know better? 

“The Condescension cursed him,” Karkat whispers, pressing his fingers to your lips. “He just… he’s nearly ten thousand sweeps old. And he still looks like he’s twenty, twenty-five, at best.” He takes a deep breath. “I was there, when… when they cut him down. It was horrible, Eridan. It was fucking _horrifying_ , I had day terrors about it for a sweep after that. Feferi, Sollux and me. We were the ones there when they said they could finally take him off the ship without killing him. He screamed during every second of it.” He shudders violently, as you try to picture the scene. You reach out to pull Karkat against your chest, but he even as he snuggles into you, he keeps talking. “It took them forty five minutes to cut everything off him. Like peeling an orange, the technician said. Except the orange kept fucking screaming and swearing and _begging us to let him die_. And when it was all over, he spat at us and said an Empress was an Empress and they were all the same in the end.” You flinch, imagining how Feferi must have taken that. “Then he wouldn’t talk to anyone, after that. We… we weren’t going to just _cull_ him. So they settled him in a corner of the _Dream Chaser_ , and put a whole medical staff in charge of looking after him. They found records that he’d been… modified. That he could speak in a frequency only seadwellers can hear. So Feferi tried that, and then a parade of seadwellers tried, tpo, but he just lied in the medcoon, staring stubbornly at the ceiling and refusing to talk to anyone. About a sweep or two later, they declared him healthy and he got into his head to walk again even if his arms and his legs were completely wasted away. You could see the _bones_ , Eridan, his skin was so thin.” You press another kiss to Karkat’s temple, tightening your hold around him. “Eventually he made himself walk again. I don’t think anyone knows where the fuck he even got the cane, but I heard he even sleeps with the damn thing. He comes and goes as he pleases, smacking people about, and Feferi doesn’t know what to do with him though so far he’s never hurt anyone beyond a well-placed bruise. But he’s an omega-class psionic with enough raw power to destroy an entire planet, by the most conservative numbers. The hysterical numbers say he’d run through a few solar systems before running out of juice. And he knows it, too. He’s a liability, a walking disaster waiting to happen, and you’re trying to tell me you spent all night chatting with him and listening to him tell you stories?” 

Liability. You hate that word like you’ve never hated anything else in the world. Liability means weakness and stupidity and disaster and nights upon nights curled up in a corner of an uncomfortably bright cell, trying to keep yourself awake because sleeping dry would be a terrible idea. Liability is the murderous anger and resentment still festering somewhere in the back of your mind, that you locked up and told yourself you threw the key away, when in truth you keep it in your hand all the time. Liability is the blade you waltz down every day, pretending you know what you’re doing, pretending it isn’t digging into the sole of your feet and splitting you up all the way to your soul. Liability is giving up your choices and everything your choices have gotten you, for the sake of indulging your feelings and letting them run unchecked. 

You close your eyes, breathing deeply, and decide you’re personally fucking offended by the idea someone like Psii would be considered a liability. He and you are nothing alike, and it hackles you up like nothing else, even though you can’t really pinpoint _why_. 

“Yes,” you say firmly, meeting Karkat’s eyes straight on. “Are you gonna tell me to keep away from him?” 

“I should,” Karkat says after a long, tense moment, swallowing hard. “I really should, but I won’t.” 

“Why?” 

He leans in to press his forehead against yours, looking at you with a strange, well-worn softness that makes you want to hide him inside your bones. 

“Oddly enough? Because I trust you to know what you’re doing.” 

“What if I don’t?” You whisper, licking your lips nervously before you start chewing on the lower one. 

“Then you come to me and we can huddle together under my desk and panic like pros over whatever fucking disaster we just unleashed upon the galaxy.” 

You choke on a laugh and Karkat smiles the hopeless smile that means he’s ready to start winging the script. 

“I love you,” you blurt out, and every cell of your body, every tiny wisp of your soul, sings with the sincerity of it. 

“I love you too,” and then Karkat leans in to kiss you like he’s worshiping your very existence and you lose track of the next five or ten minutes, completely taken by his hands on your face and his lips on yours and his tongue teasing the tips of your teeth. When he lets you go, you’re dazed and breathless and nothing hurts. Karkat grins. “So?” You blink stupidly, making a sound you swore had been meant to be words. “Not gonna show me whatever Syzygy did with you?” 

It takes you a moment to understand what he’s saying, and then you’re grinning like a fool. 

  


* * *

  


Karkat liked your little surprise. Karkat liked your little surprise enough that you’re straddling the concupiscent platform, sobbing into it every time he tugs on the little chain wound like a shoelace on the rings. Fifty rings, twenty-five and twenty-five, trailing down the curve of your spine. You’re still dripping on your third pail of the night and you’re pretty damn fucking sure you’re dangerously close to dying. You sink your teeth into the cushioned surface below you, as Karkat traces a claw down the length of your nook, then up, making you shiver as he brushes past your wastechute, and then following the natural indent of your spine until he snags the chain. Your bulge twitches, caught by his other hand, unable to retreat. He traces the little path again, changing the angle on your back a little. 

Just when you seriously start contemplating begging him to stop, you realize he’s using your own genetic material to draw patterns on your back. Your nook ripples without any input from you, squeezing out a tiny dribble of violet and your bulge wiggles and curls around the fingers of his other hand. You feel the fabric tear under your teeth when Karkat’s breath fans over the sensitive edges of your nook. The skin there is wet and glistening and every little puff of air makes your thighs tense in anticipation. 

And then he slides his tongue against your nook, from one end to the other, the tip sliding inside because you’re just that fucking _loose_ at the moment. You howl and clench and roll and die. Just. Die. He starts mouthing along the edges of your nook, and you’re so fucking done with everything, you’re just gonna let yourself go and die. Someone will get a laugh out of your death certificate: Eridan Ampora, twenty-six sweeps old, cause of death, his matesprit’s tongue-fucked him one too many times. You fold one arm in front of you, bracing you against the torn platform – you have stuffing in your mouth and what Karkat’s doing feels so fucking good on your overwrought nerve endings, you don’t even fucking care – while you rest your other elbow on the edge and reach to dig your fingers into your hair. He makes you chirr. He makes you fucking _chirr_. You didn’t even know that was a sound that existed within your vocal range before today. 

“God, you’re going to be the death of me,” he says, pressing one last kiss to the ridge at the underside of your bulge that makes the muscles of your thighs spasm. 

You don’t know if you laugh or you cry, but the sound works itself out of your throat as he leans in to lick up the little patterns on your back. The ones he drew with your own fucking slurry. You dig your claws into your scalp and find yourself howling in surprise, when he slides into you without even a fucking _by your leave_. And then you feel his lips mouthing the line of rings on your back, one side first, then the other, while his hands settle on your sides, pressing against your gills, and his fucking bulge lashes desperately against the inner lining of your nook. You have about half a second to appreciate each nuance of sensation rolling up your spine before your pan just. Shuts down. 

When you come back to yourself, he’s delicately cleaning you up with a wet washcloth and it feels so fucking nice against the rim of your nook, you purr in the back of your throat. He takes the washcloth away once it warms up, but before you can muster enough will to sit up, he presses a new one, refreshingly cold and you go boneless again. You let him take care of you, trying to make yourself work out enough words to thank him, but your tongue is a heavy, unmoving weight inside your mouth, and by the time you think you’ve salvaged enough neurons to string together a sentence, he’s mostly done. Everything south of your waist is pleasantly cool and sore, while your back is a numb wasteland of spent nerves that have summarily given up the fight and refuse to even try and decipher what’s going on. 

“Do you need to get these off?” It takes you a moment to realize Karkat is tugging at the little chain. 

You consider your options, taking stock of everything that transpired after you took off your shirt and told him he could do with you whatever he wanted, before showing him your back. You’re exhausted and sore and tingly all over. You’re pretty sure even with the soundproofing, someone had to have heard you screaming. Then you arch your back, hearing bones pop as they slide into place and flash Karkat a mischievous smile over your shoulder. 

“If you help me clear the sopor off the rings every night, I can keep them in for about a week.” 

It’s very likely you’re clinically insane. After the night you’ve had, the look on Karkat’s face makes everything damn well worth it. 

  


* * *

  


“Can we not,” you snap, reaching out to try and reclaim your bowl of cherries. Psii shifts them out of your reach and his lips twitch as the blush spreads across your face. “No, seriously. Can discussing my sex life not be a fucking thing we do? Because I think that would be mother. Fucking. _Swell_.” 

You see the cane coming from the corner of your eye and barely manage to dodge it, then you lunge. Psii shifts out of the way elegantly, avoiding your attempts with the least movement necessary. You cheat a little, trying to trip him, and find yourself holding the bowl triumphantly. It occurs to you that that was a stupid thing to do, about point two seconds after you do it. Psii doesn’t fall. Psii decides that since dirty play is now a thing that you’re allowing, he can play too. You get a cane to the gut and a shove to the shoulder and then you’re tripping back on his left foot and the bowl is out of your hand, floating midair in a tiny, controlled red-blue glow as you land squarely on your ass. 

You’re Eridan Ampora, and you just had your ass served to you by the fucking oldest troll in the goddamn universe. 

And then to add insult to injury, Psii picks a cherry from the still-floating bowl, pops it into his mouth, and smacks you square between the eyes with the pit when he spits it. 

You’re a disgrace to trollkind as a whole. 

You’re also having the time of your life. You’re not entirely sure how you ended up fighting over cherries, when you started off the night taking a walk around the hangar. You’re pretty sure you don’t really care. You still have no idea what the hell you’re doing, but after he shoved you into a pool earlier tonight, you’ve found yourself losing more and more of your reverent edge. Oh, you’re still in awe, particularly considering what Karkat told you, but you’ve decided it’s perfectly reasonable to be in awe of someone even if you want to strangle them a little. Especially when he grins at you, another pit caught between his teeth. 

“No, just because you knew his Ancestor doesn’t make it okay!” You duck the incoming pit and it bounces harmlessly off the wall. “That’s even fucking _worse_.” 

Agness and Russel will get off their shifts in about an hour, and Agness said she’d gotten her claws on some of the excess wine from the gala. You’re pretty certain that’s a disaster waiting to happen, but at the moment, you’ve decided to get ready to cross the bridge when you reach it. You’re still on medical leave, following your little breakdown, and since Karkat confiscated your tablet and told you he’d lock you up in your block if you so much as tried to inquire about the state of the ship, you suppose you should be grateful you have an unrepentant yellowblood bastard to keep you entertained. 

You roll back to your feet, ignore the sting on your back, and wonder how you’ll go about reclaiming your goddamn cherries. 

  


* * *

  


Agness’ quarters are nice enough, if somewhat claustrophobic. Administrative blocks always tend to be. They’re built for functionality, rather than comfort. Your own are relatively spacious, but only because everything in the _Leviathan_ is built on that scale. Karkat had tried to assign you a nicer set, when you first joined the crew, but you fought him tooth and nail about it and only managed to convince him to drop the subject when you pointed out it’d be blatant favoritism and very unlikely to earn you any love from the rest of trolls in the ship. You have a job and you do it with pride, because after all these sweeps you’ve learned to love it. Still, every now and then, you wonder how it’d be like, if things were different. The general consensus, however, is that you’d be dead and no one would give a fuck, so you try not to linger too much. 

By noon you’re done with six out of eight bottles of wine, Agness is soundly asleep inside her recuperacoon, Russel is sprawled on the small concupiscent platform, snoring defiantly at the world at large, and you and Psii are huddled in a corner of the room, taking turns to drink a swing from bottle number seven. The wine is sweet and lush and slides down your throat altogether too easily. 

“Are you scared?” 

You look down to find Psii leaning on your shoulder. The sound of his voice still startles you a little, because he looks so much like Captor and yet he sounds so _different_. You wonder what they did, to fuck with his throat. You wonder if it hurt. You take the bottle from his fingers, ignoring the light sparks, red and blue, tickling your fingertips. 

“You’re gonna need to narrow it down,” you say, smiling a little wryly before you press the bottle to your lips. “’cause I’m scared of a shitfuckton of things.” 

“Living on,” he answers, looking up at you. His eyes are odd, from up close, the iris and the pupil barely visible, just a shade lighter than the rest of the eyeball. “They’re gonna die,” he goes on, waving a hand at the sleeping trolls, “and you’ll still live on.” 

You make a point not to think about that. You don’t tell him that though, because you realize there are tears glistening in the corners of his eyes and you’re hit the realization of just how fucking _long_ ten thousand sweeps really is. Putting the bottle on the floor and reaching out to pull him into a tight hug is the most natural thing in the world. You can feel the tears sliding down your throat, getting caught on the edge of your gills, but you keep quiet. Agness and Russel taught you that, a lifetime ago. To shut the fuck up and just hug someone when they need it. You’ve always thought you’re kind of terrible at it, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try. As a rule, everything you’re terrible at, which is pretty much everything in general, is something you should definitely try at. Try your damn hardest, even if you never quite make the mark. Because the day you stop trying, you’re going to fold over and shatter inside out. 

“Comforted by a fucking seadweller brat,” Psii hisses into your ear, but doesn’t make any attempt to get out of the hug. In fact, he only shifts enough so he can slide an arm around your lower back. “Kankri is rolling in his nonexistent grave. Or cheering, I don’t even fucking know anymore.” 

“Yeah?” You have no idea who the fuck Kankri is, but you can’t resist the urge to tease and try and reassure him it’s okay to get a hug every now and then. “If you really want me to make it weird, I can shoosh you with unabashed pale enthusiasm.” 

He barks a desperate laugh and clings to you like a lifeline. It’s terrifying and makes you feel so damn small and insignificant you could cry. 

Instead, you hold on. 

  


* * *

  


The night before the _Dream Chaser_ is set to set off, Karkat delivers you a summons from Feferi. It specifically tells him he’s not allowed to come with you. You feel your sanity slipping between your hands as you desperately try to keep your shit unflipped. Joke’s on you, your shit is so thoroughly flipped it’s probably impossible to unflip it anymore. Still, you take another shower, freezingly cold, and go about dressing yourself in your formal uniform. You brush your hair and debate whether to take the rings on your fins off or not. In the end decide not to. Clad in solid black with just the smallest splashes of violet, the only thing featuring your sign are the cufflinks. The uniform was designed for midbloods, who don’t brag about their signs and their blood like highbloods do. It looks odd on you, or so you’ve been told more than once. It has always look odd on you. The stripe on your hair and your fins make people expect lavish and extravagant displays, but you’ve grown so used to the plain, uncomplicated midblood way of doing things that you really wouldn’t change it for anything. Karkat asked you, once, why you never bothered to replace the rings you gave him. You told him your wrists ached often enough from typing and working all night long, without half a pound of useless extra weight. You hiccup a laugh that’s half a sob, and wash your face again, hoping your eyes will cooperate and not get puffy and dumb. 

The walk to the _Dream Chaser_ feels eternal, but you keep your strides purposeful and your back ramrod straight. You can only be grateful Agness took the needles out the night before, or this would be a lot more awkward than it needs to be. Then again, there’s not a single scenario you can think of, that doesn’t end up in both awkwardness and Feferi skewering you with her goddamn culling fork. You set your jaw and clench your teeth and promise yourself you’ll try your best not to cry. 

You don’t even really register the interior of the ship, despite the fact you’ve always had a thing for this ship. It’s a beautiful ship, exquisitely decorated and every tiny, minute detail is looked after. They lead you to the audience block, and you follow the instructions on autopilot, mind crumbling at the edges. When you’re finally standing before the doors, you realize your hands are shaking. You’re going to die and your hands are shaking. That’s fucking unacceptable. Everything is fucking unacceptable about just now, and Karkat is going to cry horribly after you’re dead, but hopefully he’ll find a suitable replacement before long, because you can’t bear the thought of him alone. You hiss air through your teeth and order yourself to focus. Focus. You need to walk through those doors and face whatever’s on the other side, and… and that’s it. This is your last chance to not fuck everything up. You can’t cry and you can’t beg and whatever comes your way, you deserve it and you’re gonna take it with aplomb. You have to. 

The doors open and it’s time to face the music. You walk forward at a languid pace, ignoring the stares. And there are a lot of stares. Some of them are very, very familiar, but you don’t let yourself look at them. You keep your eyes straight ahead, staring at the third step leading up to the throne, and when you reach the end of the carpet, you fold down to one knee, as gracefully as you can. You can’t remember if they announced you or not, or if you should say something or not, but before you can open your mouth, Her Imperious Complacence speaks and the entire crowd falls silent at once. 

“You are all dismissed,” Feferi says, and her voice sounds so… so _old_ , you almost don’t recognize it. 

There’s something severe in her that didn’t use to be there. Something inside you aches, sweet and bitter, basking in the sound of her voice. You’ve never forgotten her voice. Gone is the cheerfulness of youth, replaced with authority and ease of command. Once upon a time, you were a fool in love with the idea of her, rather than _her_. That little boy, pretending to be dashing when he was barely more than a whelp, would never recognize his princess in the Empress before you. You keep your head bowed, eyes on the ground, as trolls shift and go. You want to look up and see her, _desperately_ , but you dare not to. You want to know if her face is still the picture of loveliness you remember, or if the weight of rulership has left its mark on her. You’ve seen pictures and broadcasts of her before, of course, it’d be fucking impossible not to. But you wonder what the difference will be, in person. 

“That means you too,” Feferi says after a moment, a sharp edge to her voice, and you almost think she’s talking to you, but then a voice echoes behind you. 

“Is that an order?” 

You hiss before you can help yourself, the sound of Psii’s raspy tones making your insides twist and churn anxiously. 

“He,” and you flinch to the marrow of your bones, at the contempt in her voice, “and I have things to discuss. They do not concern you.” 

“It’s my fucking concern if you decide to go Empress on him and cull his fucking stupid ass,” Psii snaps back, unfazed. You can feel your hands shaking, and it takes every ounce of self-control you _don’t_ have, to keep yourself where you are. “Because then you tip my hand and that’s bad news for everyone.” 

You can’t even hear your own pulse, the silence is that oppressive. You’re fairly sure you’ve stopped breathing. The rustle of cloth as Feferi stands up is almost obscenely loud in the empty room. 

“I do not appreciate threats.” And her voice is so even, so _calculated_ , you swallow back a whimper that feels like a spiked ball going down your throat. 

“Then it’s up to you to not deserve them, isn’t it?” 

You clench your teeth so hard the corner of your jaw throbs and you almost expect a few of them to crack. Then you let an imperceptible sigh when you hear the grand doors close, hopefully, behind the yellowblood. If that didn’t mean you’re now alone with Feferi, you’d probably collapse into a heap of mush. Unfortunately, that’s not how it’s meant to be. You console yourself with the knowledge that at least you’ll be able to be a heap of mush as much as you want, once you’re dead. 

“Why do you think I called you here, Eridan?” 

The sound of your name in her voice threatens to make you cry and your gastric sack lurches unpleasantly. 

“I do not know, Your Imperial Majesty.” 

You are extremely proud of yourself from keeping your voice from cracking like the rest of your being is threatening to. You hear the rustle of fabric as she moves, and you swallow hard when the rim of her dress enters your field of vision. 

“Guess,” Feferi says, tone meticulously neutral, dangerously so. 

You swallow hard again, feeling your whole body twitch with the urge to just _run_. You give yourself two unsteady breaths before you attempt to answer. 

“I fu—I screwed up again,” you whisper, unable to push your voice to come through louder. “And you will… you are going to make me pay for it.” 

The silence stretches, swallowing up the echo of your words. You can hear your bloodpusher, thundering inside your chest. Sweat gathers in your brow and in your palms, but you hold still, hold yourself down and servile like you should. You don’t have any real hopes of walking out of this alive, but you promised yourself you’ll face it with dignity, even if dignity is looking like an impossible chore, about just now. You’re so preoccupied with keeping your body in check that the glimmer of the culling fork catches you by surprise. You take a deep breath, hoping it doesn’t sound too much like a gasp, and force yourself to not flinch when the tips come to rest on your throat. It nudges you up and, docile, you obey the silent command, unfolding your body as you stand up to your full height. 

The most suicidal corner of your mind wants to giggle stupidly because even if she’s the most intimidating person you’ve ever faced in your life, her forehead barely reaches your collarbone. You stare straight ahead, at the inward curve of her horns, so much like the Condescension and yet nothing at all like her at once. 

“What if I said your life would be suitable payment for your crimes?” She asks, and you get the impression she’s swirling the words in her mouth like wine. 

You swallow hard. 

“I am but a troll, and you are my Empress.” 

She hasn’t pulled the prongs away, so when your throat bobbles, you feel the pointed tips dig into your skin. Though not nearly enough to make you bleed. Not yet. 

“What if I said your life was not enough?” You slip, for less than a second, and look down to see her face. It’s focused and intent, her jaw set and brow furrowed ever so slightly, eyes carefully watching your every reaction. She looks ready to go to war. Or steeling herself to cull a stupid fool. “What if I decided to take my payment from someone else, the greenblood in Equius’ ship, or the tealblood here in the—“ 

“ _Please_.” You bite the inside of your lips, mentally cursing your stupidity, but the damage is done and there’s nothing else you can do now. “Please, allow me to me to shoulder my own debt.” You keep your eyes on the throne at the back, hands unconsciously curling into fists as you dig your claws until you feel yourself start to bleed. “Surely… surely you would agree that it is better to take it out on the one responsible, than two innocent fools whose only crime was to be too kind.” 

“Kindness to you has always been a crime in itself,” Feferi says, a little too callously, and you ignore the way your eyes are stinging, because you promised you’d face this with dignity and dissolving into a blubbering mess is not very dignified. You desperately will the tears away as the prongs push a little harder against your chin, forcing you to tilt it back and bare your gills. “And maybe I want them because I know it’d hurt you more.” 

“You wouldn’t do that,” you blurt out before you can help yourself, and dig in your claws until you feel blood slowly dripping down your fingers. 

“Why would you say that?” She demands, her tone overflowing with authority you dare not deny. “Look at me, Eridan Ampora,” and she pulls the culling fork away so you can do so, “and tell me why would you say that?” 

You take a deep breath, likely the last one you ever will, and meet her eyes as instructed. 

“Because… because you’re better than that.” 

Time drips down the walls at an unnervingly slow pace. And then pain blooms on your face, hot and jarring. It takes you another impossibly long moment to realize she slapped you. You swallow hard, blink back your tears, and look back at her. You’re horrified to see wet trails down her cheeks, but you barely shift forward, not even moving properly, before the culling fork is back, prongs resting warningly on your chest. 

“I _am_ better than that.” And now it’s her, who swallows hard. “Because I am your Empress, and trollkind as a whole needs me to be better than that.” She takes a deep breath, which seems to make her seem even more regal than before. “You’ve changed, Eridan. You’ve wronged me and hurt me and insulted me, but you’ve changed.” 

“I am sorry,” you say, and your voice betrays the knot of tears lodged up your throat, but you don’t care, because _you’re sorry_. 

To the last fiber in your being, there’s nothing you regret more than all the wrongs you did to her. 

“Being sorry is not enough,” Feferi says sharply. “Being sorry won’t take it back. You abandoned me, when I needed you the most. You attacked me, when I was at my weakest. But worst of all, Eridan Ampora, you betrayed me and the trust I had in you.” You see her hand clench on the handle of the weapon, and you brace yourself for the inevitable. Instead, she pulls it back. “I _trusted_ you, above all else. And you threw it back in my face, trying to use my own damn lusus against me, because you knew how afraid I really was of failing my duty.” Her lips, painted the same fuchsia as her blood, part to let you see her teeth in a barely restrained snarl. “I was angry at you, then. I was lonely and confused and in despair, and every time I tried to reach out to you, you threw it back at my face and made me feel so _stupid_ for caring about you.” You flinch back, but you dare not look away, staring wide eyed at her. “I hated you and feared you and worst of all, sometimes, I _still_ wanted you back. I wanted all the small, sweet things we used to have, before you fucked it all up.” Her grip on the culling fork is tight enough you can hear the metal straining under her hands. “Caring about you was the worst mistake of my life.” 

“I—“ 

“I don’t care if you’re sorry,” she goes on, unrelenting. “I don’t care if you’ve changed. _I don’t care._ ” She steps back, then turns to face her throne. “This is why you’re here, because I need to be done. Because I need to tell you that I don’t care about you anymore, that you have no hold over me anymore. You’re my Chancellor’s matesprit, and I respect that, but from this moment on, there’s nothing left, between you and me. I don’t forgive you, because what you did was unforgivable, but I choose to forget it instead. Do you understand? You are a troll and I am your Empress, and nothing else.” 

You bow, in strict accordance to protocol, and pretend really hard you’re not crying. 

“Yes, Your Imperial Highness.” 

  


* * *

  


Psii is standing outside the doors, when you come out. There’s no one else around, that you can see at least. You stare down at him, uncomprehending. There are tearstains on your cheeks and your claws are still embedded in the fleshy parts of your palms, and you feel hollow like a gutted fish. Psii makes a gesture with his head and starts walking down the corridor, steps slow and unhurried. After a moment, you feel a sharp nudge on your back that makes you stumble forwards and nearly lands you off your feet. On sheer inertia, you start walking, following after him. One foot, then the other. One, two. One, two. You keep your eyes on your feet, busying yourself to match Psii’s steps as you go, because if you don’t, you’re quite certain you’ll just fall to pieces right there. A lifetime and a half later, you’re inside the familiar corridors of the _Leviathan_ , still going one, two inside your head. One, two. 

“Erid—“ 

Psii shoves Karkat out of the way, pressing the tip of his cane to his solar plexus and then shoving him into the wall until he lets out an indignant _oof_. When you hesitate, you feel another harsh nudge on your back. Then you’re in your respiteblock, standing right in the middle of it without any idea of what you should or shouldn’t do. You sway in place, dangerously close to falling, before surprisingly gentle hands start working you out of your uniform and into the same casual clothes you’ve been wearing while on leave. Then Psii tugs you down, to sit on the floor on a pile of laundry you don’t remember being there before. He holds your hands like they are breakable, and delicately pulls on your fingers until your claws slide off your flesh. You watch him rub off the blood and then wrap each hand in clean bandages with methodical, precise movements. When he’s done, you fold your hands in your lap and stare into his eyes, desperately waiting for the next cue before your pan caves in and you lose control. 

“Shoosh, now,” he rasps out, lips quirking vaguely upwards as he reaches a hand to thumb the sharp ridge of a cheekbone. “It’s okay to cry.” 

And that’s when you officially implode into a million sparkly bits of bawling failure. 

  


* * *

  


You probably look awful, between spending fuck knows how long making a mess of yourself and the fact you were already kind of precariously recovering from what you did to yourself during your manic fit. You’re scrawny, all elbows and knees and sharp corners without any softness to muffle it. And you’re hoarse and exhausted and your eyes feel the size of fucking planets, puffy and gross. You swallow hard, staring down at Karkat with a tiny, awkward smile. 

“I. Uh. I think I just got kicked out of my own respiteblock.” 

You’re pretty sure you feel your back crack when Karkat wraps his arms around you. He knocks you off your feet and you end up in a heap on the floor. 

You don’t care, it’s worth it. 

  


* * *

  


_The body is distorted in order to bend to that twisted figure_  
 _To crawl on the road lit with paper lanterns._  
 _Everyone knows the feeling, walking down the street:_  
 _This child has to cower alone._  
 _I guess the shadows reach long,_  
 _But the friends that talk have their necks aligned._  
 _You are later and before and by yourself._  
 _Oh, you’re here, you’re here!_

~ Hatsune Miku, “Dark Wood Circus.” 

**Author's Note:**

> And I think that's it.
> 
> At least for now. Maybe at some point I'll come back to this verse and just address the sheer pandemonium that's your normal, every day routine aboard the _Leviathan_.


End file.
